


take me back to the start

by windfalling



Category: Zero Escape (Video Games), Zero Escape: Virtue's Last Reward - Fandom
Genre: Background Relationships, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-05
Updated: 2014-12-05
Packaged: 2018-02-28 05:27:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2720432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/windfalling/pseuds/windfalling
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>They both know the consequences; they are both culpable. This is what they have done.</i> Akane in the forty-five years of preparation for the third Nonary Game.</p>
            </blockquote>





	take me back to the start

**Author's Note:**

> SPOILERS for both games. mentions of akane/junpei, and aoi kurashiki. speculation abound for what happened to aoi.
> 
> about the timeline--  
> i screwed up when sigma was supposed to go back to stop radical-6, but i realized it too late and didn't feel like restructuring the rest of it, so for the purposes of this fic, he goes back much earlier than he actually does.

 

 

It ends like this:

She climbs out of the hatch, jumps down, waits. A hand presses over her mouth; she resists, out of reflex. A burst of pain as the knife stabs through her chest.

Akane wakes to space grey walls and the acrid taste of disappointment.

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

There are less than fifty people at Rhizome-9.

Most are kitchen, cleaning, or medical staff; the rest are a group of researchers she has gathered to help build the project. All of them are her people, members of the organization she had built with Aoi. She knows that much of the next forty-five years will be spent working with the future Doctor Klim on the project, but for now, all she has is Sigma: a biotech undergrad who spends most of his time either in the Treatment Center or getting drunk somewhere and making cat puns.

“I suppose you don’t need a tour,” Akane had commented once they’d arrived.

“I have a good memory,” he’d said dryly, but later had grown quiet when they stepped into Warehouse A, lost in the threads of memories in his mind.

Akane doesn’t have to wonder what he sees when he walks through the halls. She already knows.

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

“I don’t know how you can do this to them,” Sigma says to her, looking down at the sleeping bodies of Clover and Alice. He turns away, presses his hand against the cool glass of Phi’s capsule. “They never asked for this.” _I never asked for this_ , is what he does not say.

“When you’re trying to save the entire human race, you have to make difficult decisions,” she says coolly.

His mouth stretches into a bitter smile. “What’s a few lives against the world, right?”

She purses her lips. “Still angry with me for hitting you? I told you, I was never going to kill either of you. Besides, if this all goes well… none of this will ever have happened.” It’s a risky move, pinning all her hopes on Sigma, but it is nothing she has not done before.

“I saw them _die_ ,” he says, voice shaking, “all of them, because of what you—what _we_ did.”

A dangerous pause. “Are you having second thoughts?”

When he is quiet for a moment too long, her mind runs rapid-fire through different things to make him stay, but she just doesn’t have time for this. She is the last person to give him the comfort—the _forgiveness_ —he wants.

Finally, he says, “No, I’m not,” and her stomach untwists. Sigma drags his eyes away from Phi’s body to meet Akane’s gaze. “I just need time, I guess. For everything to sink in.”

“I understand,” she says, gentler this time, although her nerves are thrumming with impatience. 

Time is the one thing they have in abundance.

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

The Earth begins to bleed red as the years pass. She finds herself staring out the window at it; she has been tempted to step outside and watch it from there, but oxygen is a precious commodity in space, and she will not waste it.

“Do you miss him?” Sigma asks, looking not at their home planet, but at her. 

For a moment, she isn’t sure which _him_ he’s talking about, before realizing there is only one person he could be thinking of. Junpei is first in her mind, as it is in his. 

It feels like a betrayal. 

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

(Here is the truth: 

Junpei is her heart, but Aoi is her soul. 

She misses Aoi in a different way than she misses Junpei. The main difference is this: Aoi is dead, and Junpei is alive.

When Aoi died—and no matter how many times she jumped back, tried to warn him, it always ended the same—she cried for the last time, her throat scraped raw, the emptiness consuming her whole. He took what was left of her soul with him.

Junpei is all she has left.)

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

In her sleep, she can still reach him, can still speak to him in her mind. His consciousness is as familiar to her as her own. _I love you_ , she tries to say to him, but it comes out as an apology, _I’m sorry I couldn’t save you, I’m sorry I left you, I miss you, I need you, I can’t do this alone._

Sometimes she isn’t sure what is real and what isn’t, but she likes to think that she does not dream his voice when it comes to her, forgiving, loving, granting her absolution. _You did what you could_ , Aoi says, _I don’t blame you for any of this_. The pain lessens, just a little.

Then she wakes, and there is only an aching void in her mind.

All that’s left of him is ashes. 

She does not miss the painful irony. Maybe it is Death claiming its due, she thinks, or maybe it is their fate: Kurashiki siblings, going up in flames.

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

“I just can’t stop seeing it,” Sigma tells her, haunted. “Like the infirmary—” He shudders, head in his hands.

Akane grimaces very slightly, but her patience is infinite, so she just pours him another drink and waits. She knows better than to think he trusts her — or worse, _likes_ her, even — but she is here, she is the only one who knows, the only one who is left. Part of her understands, even empathizes, but she does not have the privilege of breaking down. Not when billions of lives rest in her every action.

“I don’t even have any fucking clue what I’m doing.” Sigma grabs the glass and downs it in one go, coughing slightly. 

“You solved every puzzle,” she reminds him, “you’ve been through it before.”

“I only know the _end_ result, not how to fucking make it! And I only know what I’m trying to make because I’ve seen what I made in the future — how does that make any fucking sense?”

“You can do this,” she says, voice firm, “you’ve done this a thousand times and you can do it again.” 

He is stubbornly silent. Reflecting on the past few days and the strain it has clearly put on him, she softens her tone, her posture, and reaches out to rest a hand on his shoulder. Sigma goes rigid under her fingers, but then all the tension rushes out in a shuddering sigh, and his head drops into his hands.

“You should take a few days off,” she says, making her voice quiet and kind and gentle.

“I’m sorry,” he says as she reaches the door. At her inquiring glance, he adds, “For losing it on you. It’s just—it’s been a tiring week.”

Akane nods slightly in understanding, then leaves for her room. It isn’t until the door clicks behind her and the lock activates that she allows herself to crumple, her shoulders sagging, head bent to the ground. She stays like that for a full minute.

Then she raises her head and begins to work.

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

If she has learned anything about Sigma, it is that he has a strange habit of making cat puns and saying _meow_ at any mention of felines, and that he asks a lot of questions. His inquiries range from idiotic (“So, uh, you got a boyfriend?”) to invasively personal (“What happened to your brother?”); it has been a great exercise of her patience, though she prefers the former over the latter. He is more irritable than humorous these days, though, and spends most of his time in his room, filling pages and pages of notes.

Today, he is pensive, and his question is not unexpected, given the hours they’d just spent poring over the different timelines.

“Do you remember it? Dying?” Sigma asks, twirling a pen between his fingers. 

She gives him a curious look. “Every time. I know that you do, too.”

“It’s just so surreal.” He pauses. “The other timelines… they just keep going, right?”

“Yes.”

She almost expects him to get angry again, to lash out with guilt and shame and regret. But when he meets her gaze, there is only a sad sort of acceptance there. They both know the consequences; they are both culpable. Sigma could leave and abandon the project any time he wished, but he is still here, and she is grateful.

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

They form a strange friendship as time goes by. 

It starts off as a partnership, but years of working together on the same project has had the consequence of bringing them closer. She has become— _comfortable_ with him, almost, and it is an unsettling realization to come to.

She still does not tell him about herself, beyond what was necessary in relation to morphogenetic fields and the time jumps. She does not tell him much of anything, really. For so long, all she’d had was Aoi and Junpei—and now, not even them.

Akane thinks about how easily she can read him, how she can sense the shift in his mood before consciously recognizing it. She thinks about how he’s known her for almost as long as Aoi has.

Sigma is—different. Sigma is a means to an end. Sigma is her partner. Sigma is—

“What’s got you thinking so hard at six in the morning?”

The voice breaks her out of her thoughts, and she blinks up at him. He looks tired—as he always does, now—but there is the tiniest curve of his mouth as he looks at her. He is so rarely humorous these days that any expression of amusement catches her attention.

“I wasn’t thinking of anything,” she says, rearranging her expression.

Sigma snorts. “No one stares at cereal that intensely.”

Akane has no retort. Instead, she nods at the seat across from her, and he takes it. “What are you doing up?”

“Couldn’t sleep. You?”

“Video conference at seven.”

He frowns slightly. “A meeting so early?” His confusion clears in the next moment. “Different timezones. Right.”

They both sit there for a few long seconds, looking at each other in silence. Finally, she says, “Are you ready for the jump back?”

“I don’t think I’ll ever be. I know it’s tomorrow, but… It would’ve helped if I knew what I was going into.”

She shakes her head. “I don’t remember anything. I don’t think you tell me much about it, after.”

He makes a noise of discontentment. “Well, I’ll make sure to tell you this time.”

“You won’t have to if you succeed.” Akane does not know how this time should be any different from all the others, but she knows that there _has_ to be one where they all survive—she has caught glimpses of it, once, and it is what gives her hope.

“I know,” he says, grimacing slightly. His attention is momentarily diverted by the people trickling into the room; the facility is beginning to wake.

“Sigma.”

He looks at her, waiting.

“After my meeting, I have to go down to one of the other buildings. There’s an issue there that needs my attention.” Akane hesitates. “I most likely won’t be back until the day after tomorrow.”

He blinks. “Oh. Well, I guess this is the last time I’ll see you for a while, then.”

“Hopefully you won’t,” she reminds him. “See me again, that is.”

“Right,” he nods. “Well—” 

“Good luck,” she says quickly, before he can do anything awkwardly sentimental (like _hugging_ her). “Anyway—I should get going.”

“See you later,” he says, “or not.”

She gets up, but it doesn’t feel right to just leave him, so she touches his hand, just briefly. “You can do it. I know you can,” she says, and means it.

Sigma smiles, just a little. “Goodbye, Akane.”

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

He fails.

Disappointment is a tangible thing between them. She tries asking him about it, once, but he completely shuts her out. 

She does not try again.

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

The years pass.

Sigma grows more distant, more absorbed in the project. She rarely sees him now, and he does not need her input anymore, so she tends to other business, travelling and handling the branches of her organization. 

Akane goes back to Earth for a week, once, the first time she’s been back in years. Although she is careful not to run into Junpei, she does see him from a distance, recognizing him only because she’s kept track of him all these years. She cuts her visit short when he picks up her trail. _Not yet_ , she thinks with regret, and wonders if this is the timeline where she lives to meet him again.

When she does come back to Rhizome-9, it has been months since she’s seen Sigma. She visits to check up on his progress, but a small part of her just wants to see him again; he is the only friend she has, now.

He looks—well, he looks terrible, really. She takes in the long hair, the beard, the dark bruises under his eyes.

They stare at each other.

She turns around, leaves, and comes back with a razor in one hand and shaving cream in the other. 

“What are you doing?” He eyes her warily.

“An intervention,” she says, tossing both items into his hands. “Shave. When you’re done, come meet me in the gardens.”

Ten minutes later, he sits beside her on the bench. “I really don’t have time for this, Akane.”

“You do, actually. You need a break,” she insists, but he’s already shaking his head and standing. “We can’t do this if you work yourself to exhaustion.”

“I have a spare,” he says tonelessly. “It can continue my work.”

She’s seen him before, the small version of Sigma. Just through video files and records of Sigma’s progress. Akane has never actually interacted with the boy; she knows that Sigma has not permitted anyone else but himself to interact with the clone.

“You should name him,” she says. “You can’t just call him ‘it.’ What about Sigma Jr.?”

He looks at her, unamused.

“Fine, then. How about—hmm. Something easy to remember.” She tilts her head, thinking. “Kyle is a nice name. Kyle Klim—alliteration.”

When he begins to walk away, she reaches for his wrist to stop him. Sigma could have shaken her off if he really wanted to, but the action makes him stop. She wonders how long it has been since a human being has touched him, or even interacted with him this long. 

“Why are you here, Akane?”

 _For duty_ , she thinks. She looks at his eyepatch and his arms, thinking of the metal that lies underneath the fake skin. _And for friendship._

His hard gaze meets hers. She drops his wrist, but she will not look away. “We’re partners,” is all she says, voice even. “And this is my project, too.”

He stares at her for a long moment. “It’s good to see you again,” he finally says, and sits down.

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

“I saw Junpei,” she begins, then halts.

He barely glances away from his work, but his head tilts slightly toward her. “Yeah? Tenmyouji? How is the old man?”

“As old as you are,” she says dryly. “He’s—”

 _Still searching for me_. Akane tries not to think of what his life has become.

“He’s fine.”

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

After forty-five long years, they have finally finished.

Akane kneels down beside Sigma, injection gun in her hand. He has been staring at Phi since they had carried her to the room, but he turns to her now. 

“Are you ready?” she asks. It is a question she remembers asking a thousand times.

He almost smiles, and he touches her hand, just a brush of his fingers against hers. “Until we meet again,” he says, and she presses the injector to his neck.

She waits until his breathing slows. Then she leaves, setting the passcode lock behind her. 

All that’s left to do is wait.

 

 

 

-

 

 

 

It starts like this:

She climbs out of the hatch, jumps down, waits. There are footsteps behind her; she braces herself for the blow. 

It never comes.

Instead, there is a loud thud from behind her. When she turns, Phi is standing over Dio’s unconscious body, and Sigma is running up to them. 

Akane smiles. “So you came. I’ve been waiting for you.”

And it begins again.


End file.
